Just on the off chance that anyone who might care has missed it, today (only) is the "massive" sale for Prime members at Amazon. Bigger than Black Friday, allegedly.
Had a look and am faintly tempted by one of their Fire HD tablets, down from £119 to £59 just for today, for example. Although not sure why. No idea what I'd do with it I can't already do.
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Unless you are a prime member you can't see what the offers are.
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Don't understand. I'm not a Prime member and can see them perfectly well. When you get to the "buy" bit it says "join prime" in place of the buy button is all.
I have access to Prime through work if I want to go ahead, or apparently it's legit by Amazon to join Prime, buy, then cancel within 30 days.
But I can certainly see the offers without signing in at all. Maybe that's the key.
Anyway, twas only a passing mention in case.
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ignore me - finger trouble.
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I liked the idea of a Fire TV Stick for £19 to use on the small telly we otherwise use only as a monitor - until I read the details and found out that it has to run off the mains. So I have a stick the size of my finger in the side of my telly - fair enough - with a cable running down the wall to yet another ugly plugtop transformer. Eh?
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My Chromecast takes its power from a USB port on the tele.
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This review of the Fire TV Stick
www.techradar.com/reviews/audio-visual/av-accessories/amazon-fire-tv-stick-1274525/review/3
says it'll do the same thing but may not draw enough power from a USB to offer all its services. I suppose even with an external power source it takes up a lot less space than the pair of boxes we use to supply content to the living room telly. I may just give it a go.
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WDB, I bought the stick, installed Kodi on it and really there is a huge amount of TV you can watch from all over the world!
Obviously it is all streamed so need good internet speed but I have watched a few football matches and films and they are perfectly watchable.
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Fire TV stick has almost infinite amount of sources for watching films, TV, and live sport.
Cancelled my Sky subscription, will just stream everything for free.
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It doesn't get the terrestrial channels does it? In which case how do you get those?
And I am a TiVo user and time-shift most of my watching. How could I do that?
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>>It doesn't get the terrestrial channels does it? In which case how do you get those?
It doesn't but if it is connected to a TV the thought process is that you would have those channels via the TV!
>>And I am a TiVo user and time-shift most of my watching. How could I do that?
Can't do that either
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>> >>And I am a TiVo user and time-shift most of my watching. How could I
>> do that?
>>
>> Can't do that either
>>
I thought that Kodi thing (XBMC as was) supports that? I appreciate you have to have a backend of Windows media server or somesuch, but basically if you can get a tv feed into it then it does do recording/timeshift?
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You may be right if it is plugged into a PC or whatever but mine is just in an HDMI socket on the TV so no way to record. AFAIK !
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>> Unless you are a prime member you can't see what the offers are.
I am not a prime member yet I can see the deals - but can't buy them though.
>> it has to run off the mains
Your TV needs a mains plug. You can simply attach a multi-socket adapter and power both TV and fire TV stick from there.
Last edited by: movilogo on Wed 15 Jul 15 at 10:17
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The Firestick at £19 is cheap, I guess, but I cannot see how it would benefit me.
I have a fully "smart" Samsung TV internet connected.
This has access to all UK catch up TV, also I can stream already downloaded video, such as US TV programs, from my laptop to the TV via Samsung link installed on my laptop.
I can record to a 64GB USB memory stick and of course there is the TV's built in Freeview, as well as Freesat via a Humax PVR and a SKY dish.
As far as I can see the only benefit would be live streaming - is this correct?
Is it worth tying up a spare HDMI socket on the TV for this? (I think I have three HDMI inputs, two in use)
Last edited by: Roger. on Wed 15 Jul 15 at 14:02
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You missed out voice control ("No, you heap of junk, tennis, TENNIS, not the b***** Clangers") and of course the two major attributes of Shiny and New.
PS The new Clangers is brilliant.
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Is it worth tying up a spare HDMI socket on the TV for this? (I think I have three HDMI inputs, two in use)
Keeping one for best, Rog, in case Her Majesty drops in for tea?
Of course, you have to weigh up what you'd be gaining and there's no point in duplicating what you already have in that room. If I buy one it'll be for a smaller set in another room, where the Beestlings might watch Amazon movies with their friends, or I might slope off to enjoy something of minority interest where sound quality is a secondary consideration.
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BTW - the TV is 3D capable too - useless as there are no regular programs made in it.
I have watched Avatar in 3D, via my Samsung Blu-Ray player and it works well enough.
Yep - all Samsung, even the sound bar!
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>>As far as I can see the only benefit would be live streaming - is this correct?
Pretty much so
>>Is it worth tying up a spare HDMI socket on the TV for this? (I think I have three HDMI inputs, two in use)
Depends what you use that socket for normally? However it does very easily unplug!
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The promotion had what I imagine was its desired effect: I ordered the Fire stick, and a special-offer SD card for Beestling Minor's tablet, but while I was in the mood I also ordered the knife roll I'd been considering for a while, a new probe thermometer for the kitchen and, er, five pairs of shoelaces. It's Amazon's answer to the town with the broken parking meters that's supposedly bringing more footfall into the shops.
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Yeah - I signed up to Prime with the intention of cancelling, then realised I don't really need to cancel as it's only a few quid more than I was paying per year for the DVD rental anyway and that's now thrown in. We use that a lot.
Also bought the Fire 7" tablet I don't need and have no use for whilst it was half price. I've been looking at possibly using it with a five quid bluetooth ODB-II thingy and making it display useless car info for no reason.
Was VERY tempted by a £995 camera that magically dropped to £546 as well, but resisted long enough for it to go back up. Darned lightning sales. Trouble is, they have lightning sales every day...
Be interested to hear another view on the Fire stick, as I resisted that one on a "really honestly there's no need for this I already have everything it can do" basis.
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I thought Amazon Prime included the streaming service (Prime Instant Video) but not the DVD rental service. There's nowhere near as much to watch on Prime Instant Video compared to the DVD rental service.
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Thanks for the heads up Rob. Looks like you're right. It's always been a bit confusing as they were charging me a fiver and then another two per month in separate payments, so £7 a month. Looks like joining Prime kills the fiver but not the two, so in fact my total annual cost rises by about £30 in fact at the end of it all.
Hmm. Not really worth it for the dubious pleasure of a promised next day delivery I don't care about and apparently isn't reliable anyway, so will probably just go back to where I was.
Ta again.
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Amazon sale - Zero
